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Too Much Free Time

by Mike Masnick

Thu, May 18th 2006 2:36am





Human Smut Scanners Needed At Photobucket And MySpace

from the another-job-for-the-digital-working-class... dept

We were just talking about digital working class jobs and how web filters suck -- so is it any surprise that some companies are now rapidly trying to hire human smut scanners to spend their days staring at photo after photo to try to catch "bad" pictures quickly? Specifically, this is targeted at MySpace, which gets so much bad publicity due to those who misuse the site. With politicians looking to fight back against MySpace, the company has been building up its own roster of employees to monitor as much as possible -- and also put pressure on Photobucket (the main service used by MySpace users to host images on MySpace) to hire a similar group of human watchers. As the article notes, software just isn't cut out for the job -- so, instead, people sit at computers and scan approximately 200 random photos per minute, looking for anything naughty to delete. Quite a job, right? Of course, both companies might find a better solution in distributing the workload. I'm reminded of Jay Walker's plans to build a massive "neighborhood watch" system, whereby people stuck at home could earn some extra money staring at photos taken from security cameras at various locations. Distributing the workload over large groups of people and paying them for each photo reviewed could help these companies build up their "human" filters much faster. In fact, this seems like just the type of set up that Amazon's Mechanical Turk was designed to do.

29 Comments | Leave a Comment..


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  1.  
    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, May 18th, 2006 @ 3:53am

    FIRST!!
    Go smut!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  2.  

    dreamjob for pedofiles?

    identicon
    throbi, May 18th, 2006 @ 3:57am

    so they get paid for finding those pictures -and adding them to their collection! brilliant!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  3.  

    where can I sign up for tha gig!

    identicon
    Tyshaun, May 18th, 2006 @ 4:05am

    Where can I get that job. I need a nice secondary income stream.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  4.  

    looks like a job for CrazyPunk

    identicon
    CrazyPunk, May 18th, 2006 @ 4:40am

    I am also interested in getting a job as "smut scanner" :P

    I am currently stuck home with no decent income. I like working with pcs and am good at it too and am willing to "scan for smut" as a job. It should be easy, look at a pic, click GO or DEL and move on to the next one. Kinda like the rating system on ratemyfinger/poo.com but then with two choices.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  5.  
    identicon
    Drama2Sell, May 18th, 2006 @ 5:38am

    Will scan smut for food.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  6.  

    It's The Same Thing.....

    identicon
    Dam, May 18th, 2006 @ 5:56am

    Having a wide open internet and services like Myspace being essentially unregulated is the same as having open borders. With no supervision or policing going on, the scum floats to the top, drowing out the users. It's said by many that most of the illegals coming across the border are good hard working people, and I believe that. But the criminals get all the attention. So it is on Myspace and others like it.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  7.  

    Ironically...

    identicon
    JimmyJamz, May 18th, 2006 @ 6:37am

    the ad pictures on myspace are borderline. So they want to promote and gain ad revenue through smutty pictures but turn around and scold users for uploading them? Don't get me wrong, as a youth group leader I agree with the "smut filter" but just logging in I'm forced to view a huge picture of a scantily clad woman. Tone down the ads to, I mean it's a site basically designed around high scool age kids. Do they really need to get a "date" or get "laid tonight"?

    In the trenches,
    Jim D.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  8.  

    calm down about the immigration, seriously

    identicon
    Eileen, May 18th, 2006 @ 6:43am

    LOL... nice analogy. teenage brats with nothing better to do than post suggestive or lewd photographs of themselves on myspace are to the god-fearing clothed variety just as mexican criminals are to hardworking illegal immigrants! Why didn't I think of THAT before?!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  9.  

    Re: It's The Same Thing.....

    identicon
    Lisa, May 18th, 2006 @ 7:01am

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  10.  

    Re: It's The Same Thing.....

    identicon
    Lisa Foster, May 18th, 2006 @ 7:01am

    Amen!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  11.  

    In other news...

    identicon
    Ben McNelly, May 18th, 2006 @ 7:13am

    Immigration officials have recently begun cracking down on naked immagrants coming over through the internet. A spokesperson for IIF (Internet Immigration Filter) says that they are in need of computer literate backwards southern people, who hate naked immigrants, to help with thier filtering. "We have not come this far to let our warped little children's lewd and indecent photos be outshadowed by naked mexicans.."

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  12.  

    Re: calm down about the immigration, seriously

    identicon
    DanK, May 18th, 2006 @ 7:14am

    why should we calm down about the immigration? What do you propose gets done about it?

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  13.  

    Re: In other news...

    identicon
    Sha, May 18th, 2006 @ 7:36am

    PUH!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  14.  

    reality check

    identicon
    kilroy, May 18th, 2006 @ 7:44am

    SMUT is smut and illegals are ILLEGAL - period. If you are a hard-working illegal alien you are still a criminal. If you are a smut peddler you might be one too depending on the law-of-the-land where you are. You can justify it all you like and not change the facts...

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  15.  
    identicon
    Lost in Ohio, May 18th, 2006 @ 7:44am

    Can we keep the pictures we find?

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  16.  
    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, May 18th, 2006 @ 8:56am

    If you think scanning images for smut is time consuming, try scanning smut on a video hosting site. Yes, I was a smut scanner.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  17.  
    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, May 18th, 2006 @ 9:02am

    The trouble is not all the "bad" pics are necessarily overtly naughty. I admit I've perused a fair amount of adult content over the years, and I'm forever coming across pics that aren't clearly explicit that I know were pulled from adult content sites. If a profile has basically no content but yet has 900 friends, and a pic that looks like she could be a stripper, it's a good bet it's just a "scam" profile.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  18.  

    Mycroft would be better than mturk at this

    identicon
    Benjamin, May 18th, 2006 @ 9:19am

    Check it out - for this sort of distributed checking, a lot more appropriate than mturk's micropayment model: http://mycroftnetwork.com

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  19.  
    identicon
    anonymous coward, May 18th, 2006 @ 10:02am

    paid to look for porn? where do i sign up?

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  20.  

    Spammers and Liars Ruined Myspace

    identicon
    Intergalactic Hussy, May 18th, 2006 @ 10:41am


    Myspace: Good in theory, terrible in execution.

    Sigh...I remember the days before I had "identity theft" (so to speak) in that wretched place. And I actually only had FRIENDS as friends! And still...argggh...I'm safe here...I guess...

    MUAHHHH!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  21.  

    Re: where can I sign up for tha gig!

    identicon
    Millionaire, May 18th, 2006 @ 11:56am

    Do you honestly expect to make that much $$$

    It would be something like$.005/pic, so at that rate 200pics/minute = $1 which then equals $60/hour which is roughly equivalent to $120k


    Nevermind, as you were...

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  22.  

    Do they really need to get a "date" or get "laid t

    identicon
    Your students, May 18th, 2006 @ 11:57am

    Yes

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  23.  

    Re: In other news...

    identicon
    Anonymous Coward, May 18th, 2006 @ 11:58am

    HAHA!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  24.  

    Re: Re: where can I sign up for tha gig!

    identicon
    Me again, May 18th, 2006 @ 12:01pm

    But what if I wrote a program that "checked" automatically...at least in addition to my normal checks. Double your pleasure, double you profits...just this is a different form of adclicking scams.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  25.  
    identicon
    ..., May 18th, 2006 @ 8:18pm

    A very interesting job becoming available but I guess it's necessary. The bad part about it; from my understanding it's these same people that post the "bad" pics on myspace that feel they are violated/ invasion of privacy when people they do not want to witness the pictures see them. When will they realise it's a public domain or at least why put them up if you don't want the world to see.

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  26.  

    exactly

    identicon
    The Technocrat, May 22nd, 2006 @ 1:11pm

    I wrote on this a while back, on using a service like MT to pay people for AI training. The mTurk people responded pretty well...here's to hoping it comes true... link

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  27.  
    identicon
    Jodi M Honeycutt, May 24th, 2006 @ 10:54pm

    Where do I apply?

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  28.  

    Has Myspace Ruined Your Life?

    identicon
    Chris James, Sep 24th, 2006 @ 3:35pm

    I couldn't help but noticed how so many peoples lives have been disrupted due to Myspace.com. I just created a new site called RuinedMyspace.com...tell us your story!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]

  29.  

    i think this is gay!

    identicon
    Skillet, Jan 18th, 2007 @ 4:31pm

    IF KIDS ARE GETTING THROUGH THE WEB BLOCKERS THEN LET THEM. IF THEY GET CAUGHT THEY GET CAUGHT. OH WELL. JUST LET 'EM HAVE IT THEIR WAY. SOMEHOW SOMEWAY EVERY KID GETS THROUGH THESE FILTERS SO WHY SHOULD WE WASTE MONEY ON THE KIDS WHEN WE CAN WASTE MONEY ON OTHER STUFF!!!!

    [ reply to this | link to this | view in thread ]


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